Purgatory
by FloraOne
Summary: Short stories set in the La Douleur Exquise universe (aka 'the break up arc never ended' universe). Mamoru burns a little in his own selfmade hell while he patches Usagi back up after a battle, and other stories.
1. Bleeding

_This is set in the same universe as my fic "La Douleur Exquise" (ya know, the one with the sex pollen and the break-up arc never ended universe). Lots of people yelled at me wanting more in that universe, so here I go torturing these two some more._

_This is set BEFORE La Douleur Exquise. (And also, really, without having read that fic, __**you could just read this as canon break up arc, aged up**__. It fits either way. They're broken up in canon break up arc logic, all you need to know.)_

_My eternal thanks to my beta, uglygreenjacket, who's been missing my writing when I burned in my own special brand of thesis-hell and who's so enthusiastic about me getting back to fic-writing that she endures me writing angsty shit when she prefers a happy ending. (But there _is_ a happy ending! It's in La Douleur Exquise!)_

_Anywayyyy –_

* * *

Purgatory

A short story series set in the La Douleur Exquise universe

Story 1: Bleeding

* * *

Something was off.

Yes, Usagi had been hit. _Again_. But, usually… usually she was made of _way_ harder stuff than this.

Mamoru drew in a sharp breath when Usagi took a hit that was meant for him and cried out in a way that crushed every last nerve ending in his body, made his hands tremble in terror and his lips scowl in utter, mindless, cruel irritation.

It was a droid, this time. One of those humanoid creatures with the black moon sigil that appeared sometimes as if lost in time, without purpose and yet seemingly all the more destructive for it. This one seemed to come with an exuberance in power. And claws.

Claws that currently lodged itself into Sailor Moon's back.

_No._

He moved without conscious thought. It was utter reaction, his body moving without his input. It was a visceral, magnetic thing, this need to protect her. It was all he would _ever_ do.

The robot screeched when he snapped its neck.

That would obviously not be enough to keep it down, but for now it would have to do.

He didn't even slow down. One step, destroy, next step, _Usako_.

"Ow!" she protested with a flinch and that accusing glare when he pulled at her.

It was unfair and irrational this anger that bubbled up in him as he crouched down to cradle her against him and check the wound just beneath her shoulder. How dare she risk her life for him. How dare she be so reckless. How dare she jeopardize what he's given _everything_ to protect. Gave up _her_, so she might be safe – from him and everything else.

He growled at her wound, fingers probing the wound to the sound of her hiss. She'd had worse, definitely. It didn't even bleed that much - he was going to be able to fix her up quickly, this time. It would need sewing up, that was for sure, but the torn fuku on her back made it look worse than it really was – it was shallow enough that he hoped this one might not leave a scar for once.

He hated _nothing_ more than those scars on her.

It was when the terror subsided, bottomed out through his lungs via his breath, that he realised the position he'd maneuvered them into.

Usagi's lips against his neck as he'd wrapped both arms and knees around her, cradling. He'd cocooned her fully, wrapped himself around her as thoroughly as he could, his face against her cheek as he peered down her shoulder, his hands on her back, pressing against the small patch of pooled blood.

He ripped himself away from her. Her eyes were a little wide looking up and turned a little harder as she answered his prolonged stare.

He never did manage to turn the frustration into something that didn't look hostile. He supposed it was for the better, shrouding his pain and longing into angry scowls so she would never see.

Behind them, he heard the creature stir. But he didn't turn to look. Instead, his eyes stayed firmly on Usagi.

"Your turn," he bit out instead.

She blinked, then seemed to shake herself out of whatever was keeping her mind occupied.

With a twirl and a ripple of her pink and _unfathomably_ powerful magic, she blasted the droid out of existence.

She sighed in relief, features smoothing over and wand bouncing against her thigh with her shoulders sagging and she cringed, the movement apparently pulling at her wound.

He was staring. Frowning hard, most likely. But something had been _off_.

"What's wrong?" It sounded like a curse from his lips and Usagi rolled her eyes.

"Nothing."

He felt his entire face tighten in irritation, a sharp headache shooting into his temples. But she flipped open her communicator and effectively ignored him.

Three high pitched beeps and then there was Minako's voice coming through the tinny speakers. Then Makoto's. Usagi informed them quickly that they could turn around and head back to bed. They'd dealt with it already.

Then she shot him that look. The one that hurt so badly it routinely choked him.

_I miss you_, it screamed. _I'm hurting_, it cried.

Her eyes had been painted in that message for _years_ and he just didn't know how to make it _stop_. How to make her hate him. How to ease their pain. Or at least hers.

It went as fast as it came, schooled over into Usagi's professional mask that she'd started to don around him a couple years back whenever they were Sailor Moon and Tuxedo Mask.

With a sharp nod she turned to go.

But there was _one_ kind of pain he _did_ know how to get rid of for her.

"_Wait_!" he nearly shouted, voice wavering.

She stopped, blinking impossibly big and mesmerizing and _unfair_ eyes up at him.

"Your shoulder," he said as way of explanation.

"Oh," she said, deflating. "Right."

Around them, the concrete cut from a glowing orange to sudden pitch black. He started, but only Usagi did a visible double take as her eyes moved up the imposing steel structure above them.

Midnight. Time for Tokyo Tower to go to sleep and its lights to go out.

It was harder to see her in the dark now, and for some reason it was a relief. He felt a little bit freer this way. Like he didn't have to constantly mask his eyes. Didn't have to keep them from screaming back at her.

_I miss you, too._

_I'm dying. This is too hard. Take me back. Please._

_God, please._

"Well, see, I don't think you should patch me up this time. There's—"

He interrupted her almost with a growl. "Excuse me?"

She sighed, and with a push at her chest, her transformation exploded into ribbons. He closed his eyes automatically - both in respect and _necessity_ because he would not be able to take the sight of her naked skin. Nevermind the fact he really didn't deserve to see it.

When he opened them back up, Usagi was left in a very loose, simple tank and a pink mini skirt in the heat of this humid Tokyo summer night. When she turned, he could see with a jab to his lungs that above the long, welting, bleeding cuts was an equally shredded and bloody gauze pad taped to her shoulder blade, only partially obscured by her top.

"I don't—" she started. Her voice broke off when he jerked into sudden, quick movements and his fingers peeled at the bloody rag.

"You have stitches." His voice was one big accusation.

"I do," she sighed.

"Why the _fuck_ do you have stitches, Usagi?" It was injured pride wrapped in fury that flew from his voice, as if she'd personally insulted him. And she kinda had. "They're _fresh_," he added in disdain.

It was _his_ job to tend to her wounds. No one else's. It was _his_ job to sew her back together and make sure it was _perfect_, make sure she was ok with his own hands. He trusted no one else with it. Even when he hated when it needed to be done at all, died a thousand deaths whenever she got injured in the first place, it was his job to put her back together. It tethered him. He could protect her this way. It was _his_.

It was the _last_ privilege he had. The last one he was allowed to keep. And yet, here…

"They're ripped. It wasn't done tight enough for battle. It's a bloody mess," he hissed.

"I know."

"_Why_ do you have—"

"Why does anyone ever have stitches, Mamoru?" she interrupted him with a huff and her voice tinted in righteous irritation. "I injured myself and went to the hospital."

He growled. It's feral and hostile and intimidating and he couldn't hold the venom out of his voice. "Why didn't you come to _me_?"

She didn't answer. Instead she stubbornly stared off into the distance.

The headache had turned into a sharp, angry thrum, and with a ripple of light, he was back in his jeans.

For once he didn't care what the touch would give away. He curled his hand ever so gently around her, his touch completely at odds with the sheer tension in his face, and pushed the heel of his hand into the small of her back.

"C'mon," he said. He left her no room to argue.

The car ride was short and silent and agitated all kinds of uncomfortable, and he killed the engine and hopped out to get the door for her. Then he got it knocked straight into his crotch instead, when she opened it herself.

He guessed he deserved this and a million more doors pushed straight into his balls every minute of every day.

He grunted, and Usagi's hand flew to her mouth, eyes blown wide.

"Sorry!" she bellowed.

"S'okay," he groaned.

One tense elevator ride later and he dug out sterile steel instruments, cotton pads, and hydrogen peroxide. He placed them all next to the clean cloth and bowl of water he'd already placed on the coffee table.

Someone else had done this for her. The thought crawled up his skin. Someone had taken this from him, when it was his.

Senshi wounds healed fast and weird and it was easier not to draw suspicion when unsuspecting civilian doctors were not involved. It was why he'd been privileged to do this for her ever since he'd so much as started med school. And yet…

One trip more, and he growled at his medical kit. He was out of lidocaine. Out of all the days, and all the things to have forgotten to stock up on… He was going to hurt her. (Not that he didn't always hurt her as it was…)

He returned with the rest of his medical kit and a dejected slump to his shoulder. One by one, he laid out everything he would need on the coffee table for easy access.

"I'm out of anesthetic," he admitted with a wince. "I'll be as careful as I can, but it's gonna sting."

She shrugged. "I've had worse."

The words plummeted in his stomach. He didn't want his touch to feel offensive to her. He certainly didn't want his touch to be painful to her. And he really didn't want her to compare it to a random doctor's at a random hospital and choose them over him next time - _again_.

Her back was turned to him, her feet tucked beneath her, her eyes on the view of his balcony. She'd apparently opened it while he was gone – the thin, white curtains fluttered into the room as if moved by restless ghosts.

He glared at her top in a way that made the headache even worse. As if the glare alone could fix the impasse he was currently met with.

In order for him to access the wound properly, and if he didn't want her to go home in a ruined, bloody tank on top of that, she'd need to take her shirt off.

Yet, his heart really, _really_ couldn't take her sitting in his dark apartment, barely more than a meter away from his bed, without her shirt on. He _couldn't_.

He swallowed, and with his eyes pressed closed tightly and a mantra of willing his brain NOT to save this image for his dreams for the rest of bloody agonizing _time_, he whispered, "you'll need to take your shirt off."

Usagi reacted immediately, completely and utterly unperturbed by the potential prospect of nudity (as per fucking usual) and tugged at the fabric. It lifted out of her skirt to the sound of slipping fabric and it felt so oddly loud to Mamoru that he noticed, to his horror, he was holding his breath.

_What a sad, creepy man you are, Chiba._

"Wait," Mamoru said again. One trembling hand reached out as the fabric lifted, and he pinched it between two fingers and held it away from the wound. "You'll bleed through the fabric."

"Oh," she said. It sounded full of weight. "Thanks…"

He willed his hands to not shake, but it didn't help. It didn't help that he'd done this before, in a situation such as this one, way too often. It didn't help that his hand brushed against her warm, soft back as he helped her get the shirt off so she wouldn't ruin it. Didn't help that her skin broke out in goosebumps where he'd touched. Didn't help to see the fabric slip off her golden hair and drop to his floor in an unceremonious heap.

He swallowed.

Usagi wasn't wearing a bra.

"The straps hurt with the wound," she said, as a way of explanation. She was still facing forward, all he could see was her back.

It was too much. He couldn't do this. He _couldn't_.

He could, and he did. He willed the tremor away and out of his hands by sheer willpower because he wasn't a fucking doctor for nothing and shaking hands wouldn't do when tending to an open wound. This was just skin. He saw skin every fucking day. He could do skin.

And so because apparently he was a fucking magician, his hands were completely still when he peeled the tattered rag of a ruined gauze pad carefully off her bloody skin, threw it in the bin he'd moved underneath the coffee table first of all, and then dabbed the clean white cloth and moved it back to her skin.

She tensed up visibly, the muscles in her back rippling against his fingertips.

"Just water for now," he whispered into the dark. "I'll warn you."

She nodded, and with gentle strokes he began to clean her skin, slowly and carefully.

She didn't say anything, just sighed once. Deep and sad and resigned.

The little wash bowl had started turning red after he wrung the cloth out for the third time, but her back was damp and the only blood remaining was the fresh, light one glistening from the scratches. And, a little worse, a darker burgundy, from where the scratch had pulled a few of the stitches.

The latex snapped noisily as he sheathed his hands in white medical gloves that felt like armor right about now.

"The antiseptic now," he whispered, and Usagi's shoulders tensed back up when he dabbed the little piece of cotton against the mouth of the small bottle.

"So, how did this happen?" He'd said it to distract her. Get her talking, because this was going to sting. He hadn't prepared for his words to cause her to tense up even further.

"I fell, uh…" he _felt_ her falter, search for words, every muscle tense "…off a lofted bed straight onto the edge of a desk," she mumbled uncomfortably.

He frowned. "Since when do you have a lofted bed?" he asked. "Now," he added, and dabbed the cotton against the portion of the skin that was left mangled between the torn, black, _offensive_ threading.

She hissed sharply through her teeth and he cooed almost in reflex, gentling his touch and shushing her.

"…I don't," she whispered.

His hands stilled. Confused. It took him a while.

_Oh god._

_Oh god, no._

It hadn't been her bed.

"Oh," he said dumbly.

His mind raced through every guy he'd ever seen her with. Every single fucking piece of unworthy trash of them.

Her 22nd birthday was just a few days ago. Usually the time Minako heralded another example for the douche parade, practically wrapped in red ribbon and handed over to Usagi to spend the evening with.

_Oh god._

Suddenly the jealousy over having someone else sew her up paled very much in comparison. It felt like a boiling, sizzling, oozing pit that opened up beneath him and threatened to swallow him whole.

"Oh," he repeated.

His voice sounded hollow and far away when he spoke again.

"Are you gonna see him again, then?"

A minute ago, he wouldn't have thought it might have been possible for him to be _more _aware of her half naked body clad in only that little pink skirt in his dark one-bedroom apartment, with her soft skin beneath his touch and her legs pressed against the cushions where he usually sat. He didn't think it possible. But he was. He _felt_ her move. Felt the miniscule jostle of the couch cushion as she tensed her elbows and clenched her fist, felt it move.

She didn't speak for a while. He was too terrified to ask again. So instead, once he had her wound cleaned and sterile, he lifted his hand and began to do what he'd been taught to never do – remove stitches from a fresh, bleeding wound, only to sew it back together.

"This might hurt," he warned, before he brought steel to her blood.

He was careful. _So_, so careful. There wasn't a single patient he had ever been as careful with as this precious, magical person before him. His princess. His unattainable dream. But his mind was whirling, and the pliers slipped off the string and into her wound.

"Shit," he cursed, and she cried out. "I'm so sorry," he said.

His voice sounded like a beg.

She shook her head at him.

He tried again. This time he pried it free.

He held his breath when she finally spoke.

"I want to _want_ to see him again," she whispered.

He frowned. His throat hurt so much, the painful lump in it obstructing every swallow and breath. His headache pulsed in his temple.

"What's that supposed to mean?" he whispered back.

With a flick of his wrist, the black thread fell into the water bowl, a little trail of red dissolving in the fluid like ink.

Usagi sighed – so very, very resigned.

He brought the pliers back to her skin. The next stitch came out easily, she didn't jostle at all. But this wound was bloody huge, and currently broken.

He couldn't see her, of course. But by the tone of her voice he knew exactly what look was in her eyes and it hurt to only hear it.

"He looks at me with the right amount of interest but not at _all_ like... completely and irrevocably in love," Usagi said and shrugged. He moved one hand to her shoulder, applying gentle pressure to still her movement, and felt her shiver.

"Not like Seiya," Usagi added.

His fingers twitched and he felt her flinch – he'd accidentally jostled the wound. But he couldn't help it. His skin tingled just with the reminder.

"Sorry," he breathed again. And then, even quieter, "What do you mean?"

He felt like a broken record today… At least the broken part was definitely on par, he supposed.

"You know like..." she stopped briefly, and her hair moved a little with her head, dropping forward. "Not like Seiya in the way that this guy isn't like, _waiting_ to pull down all the stars for me if I just said the word."

I'm_ gonna pull down all the stars for you_. _ME_, his mind yelled._ I love you more_.

Except he wasn't allowed to.

His hand moved from her shoulder with a jolt. He forced himself back to work. Another tiny piece of black medical string floated into the water. The last. He reached back towards the table, then held an ice pack to the skin next to the wound, numbing it as best he could without aneasthetic, before flushing it out ever so carefully. She didn't even flinch.

"Less… intense. Just interested? Not like… You know, in the way that I know I won't hurt them so much when I can't feel what they feel," she whispered, and it hurt. It hurt so badly. "Like they'll be perfectly fine when I inevitably walk away."

He felt it prick his eyes. Because it was exactly what he wanted her to feel when he walked away. For her to be perfectly fine. For her to laugh and giggle and tumble in lofted fucking beds. Instead it hurt. It hurt him and it hurt her and it was unbearable.

He freed the needle from its sterile packaging, and prepared it, then returned the ice to her back, to numb it down further, and felt the cold seep into him from it as well. He hoped it might numb him too.

The curtains rustled with the wind that blew in from his open balcony doors. Her voice became quieter still.

"I've always ... wanted the first time to be with you."

He closed his eyes, before opening them back up and lifting them to the ceiling. The tears pooled in his eyes in complete silence, and he managed to hold his breath, managed not to gasp. His skin crawled so badly. This was such fucking torture, all this conflict in his heart.

"I thought…" she whispered, "I thought it was time to get it out of the way. Then I changed my mind, freaked out, and fell off a bed."

He squeezed his eyes shut tightly, felt a pair of tears slip past its confines and drop down his chin, his adam's apple, into his lap. He hated himself for the relief. He hated himself for the other set of feelings whirling deeper in his gut. More possessive. Darker.

Everything inside him screamed. Screamed at him to either lock her up somewhere so no one might ever get to touch her if he couldn't, or – much deeper, much more pressing, much more revolting – the need to press her back into this couch and shove into her right then and there so no one would ever be able to take what was his. And do it again and make her come a million times on his cock and his mouth and his fingers again and again and again until she would not ever WANT anyone else to do this to her. Ever.

He didn't know what sort of dark, powerful magic made his voice remain steady, appear calm and almost _bored_.

"If that's what you want, I'm sure you'll find the right person for it," he said. "The needle, now."

He felt her tense just as he finally pierced the skin in practiced, automatic movements. His fingers flew, practiced, fast. The ice seemed to have done the effect, numbing her down, she didn't seem to feel most of what he was doing. Yet, her shoulders were stiff and unyielding and shook, just that little, and she fell completely silent. He knew the tremors weren't for the stitches.

He worked fast. Oh so careful, but fast – if he was fast, it wouldn't hurt her. Pierce, tie, cut. Pierce, tie, cut. Over and over. Old wound and new, he watched the skin pull back together underneath his touch.

When it was done, his hands hovered, his breath held.

She would go now. She would leave and find someone to… to…

He swallowed. He peeled off his gloves with a pop and brought his hands back to her wound. With careful, careful fingers that barely touched at all, he stroked the length of it, just to the side, not actually touching the wound. Allowing himself the gentle caress, just the pads of his fingers first, then his whole palm, running down her spine with barely a bit of pressure. Down, down, down across soft skin and scattered, puckered and faded scars that he loathed so much.

She shivered, goosebumps rushing down every last patch of skin, disappearing down into her skirt and reappearing on her legs. That wasn't new – it happened every time he did it, every time he touched her like this when he was done patching her up.

She'd once, very, very long ago, admitted to enjoying the sensation quite a bit. It had opened up a big untouched black box of forbidden yearning that he never dared to poke at in his mind, because it was his _one_ way that he could still touch her, just after he'd patched her back up, his one way that he was still allowed to make her shiver beneath his fingers. As always, he desperately wanted to replace his stroking fingers with his lips.

If he ever were to touch that hornet's nest of a loophole, he'd be forced to put a lid on it, and he'd lose it like he already lost all of her.

Someone else had patched her up, though. And he wasn't doing a good job, no painkillers adding to his shame. She would replace him with this as she was planning to replace him in her bed. Another loss added to his long, long list.

His hand stopped at the base of her spine, lingered, trembling. Then he snapped out of it and reached for clean pads and tape.

The second it was attached firmly and safely to her rapidly healing wound, Usagi leapt off the couch and he _yelped_. He covered his eyes with the crook of his elbow and pressed tight, hiding both his tears from her view and her breasts from his.

He heard fabric slip back into place, and before he'd wiped his face and found his composure and deemed it safe to look again for all intents of the action, she was halfway to the genkan.

"I can drive you." He unfurled his legs in a hasty, ungraceful tangle and got up, walked after her.

She'd already slipped into her shoes.

"No need," she said. Without another word, without so much as a single look into his eyes, she slipped out of his apartment.

His forehead hit the door when she'd long gone. His headache a sharp, piercing, writhing reminder of the hell he lived in.

All this time he thought it might all be easier if she hated him. But every time she did, it felt like he was being ripped apart from the inside out in new, even more painful, twisted ways.

* * *

_So, WHY do I love break up arc fics you ask? Because I don't actually hate the break up arc AT ALL, just its execution. What I love about it? The powerful, visceral PINING of it. We never got more Usamamo kisses in a season than during the break up arc, did you know that? And in episodes where we could see Mamoru HURT over this (like the sleeping beauty ep) it was delicious, amazing, angsty goodness. You know? The kind that came across in these two or three episodes DURING THE WHOLE BREAK UP ARC ONLY because at other times Mamoru kind of forgot he wasn't being Season 1 douche!Mamoru but actually miserable about this and in love so badly that it hurt. So yeah, that kind. The kind that I want to get more of. Hence why I like to write this angsty shit xD._

_Anyway! My thesis is ABOUT TO BE DONE and so I'll try to be posting more frequently again from now on! This right here doesn't, in fact, have to be a stand-alone either. I have lots more ideas for a scenes in this universe to torture them more with. All those fantasies that hit Usagi in the bubble, for one. Or ya know, that time Mamoru had to endure Seiya's puppy eyes in this universe? Lots and lots more purgatory possibilities. If you guys are into it, that is! Let me know!_


	2. Crying

_Anyway, ever wondered how a Mamoru that was still in the break up arc narrative would have reacted to Seiya doing his thing in Stars? Well, if you have, then you're like me, lol, and I have a present for you._

_Again, I'm going with "he" for Seiya. Because this is animeverse and in it he presents himself as such. Anime-Seiya refers to himself as "ore", which - in comparison to the other, humbler male pronoun "boku" - is the machoest, manliest way you can refer to yourself in Japanese, and he does so especially in the lines and songs I've referred to in this fic._

_Fair warning to all Seiya haters out there: I'm not one of you lol. (In fact, please, go read my 'In defense of Seiya' essay on my tumblr on him, I dare you to lol!) Still, don't worry, I am an usamamo shipper, as you know. Plus, you know how this story ends, because:_

_**This is a prequel.** It's set both **before La Douleur Exquise AND Purgatory Story 1: Bleeding.**_

_Anyway strap in, this is the angst-bus, you've been warned. This series is called Purgatory for a reason._

* * *

Purgatory

A Short Story Series set in the La Douleur Exquise universe

Story 2: Crying

* * *

It was perhaps the most self-punishing habit Mamoru had ever developed, and yet he simply couldn't stop.

He'd recently moved the stereo to the shelf directly by his bed so he could push the back-button simply by reaching out.

He didn't have to focus on it anymore, or even glance across. He lay in the dark of his apartment, neon lights flickering through his windows and open balcony door and painting his life and his ceiling in wriggling, erratic shadows, and reached out his hand blindly. He pressed the button before the song had even ended fully.

His stereo did have a repeat function. One he very mindfully didn't use. Because he told himself he could stop after one more listen. He could. He had to. He didn't actually _want _to do this.

And yet, once again he reached out and the song started up with the distinct, climbing, smooth melody of a synthesized, fake orchestra from a computer that could ever so just be mistaken for the real thing even though it wasn't.

_Search for your love_

He hated that song. He hated it so much.

* * *

It had been easier before. And at the same time, it was kind of scary that any time within the past two years could have been betitled this way ('easier'), since they were the worst years he had ever lived through. (And, well, that did include the year before those which he'd spent being brainwashed by the enemy and kicking Usagi across a floor.)

Two years. He'd been managing to endure her forlorn, wounded eyes for two years. Through alien invasions manifesting at Mugen Academy and watching her pure heart crystal get taken right in front of his eyes and watching her plummet into a black hole with dead eyes to save Sailor Saturn when there was nothing he could do but die inside once she'd disappeared. Through cursed circuses destroying her dream mirror with his name on her lips and watching Nehelenia (when she should have sealed into exile forever but somehow wasn't after all) kidnap and torture the one person he lived for and there was nothing he could do but run after her barefoot through snow and thorns to get her back and still helplessly fail.

Watching the sedulous, untiring hope return into Usagi's eyes whenever he was willing to die for her (over and over again), and yet every time he steeled himself to crush her, to keep going, to keep lying, to keep her at arm's length, to keep her safe because he was her doom and he could never have her.

Which made sense, of course—

He'd never been allowed to have her in any life, after all.

He'd told himself all these years it would be so much easier if she stopped looking at him like this. If she stopped loving him. If she stopped waiting for him.

It wasn't easier. It was the most excruciating thing he'd ever had to survive, and what did that say about him?

Because then there came Seiya Kou. With boasting smiles and playful insults and calling her Odango. And suddenly… suddenly his Odango was back. She was back and she was puffing herself up and loudly hurdling insults right back and receiving flirty smirks in return and it wasn't him, it was Seiya. And while she did that, she was no longer looking sad.

He felt like the biggest asshole for wanting the sadness in her eyes to return. Because if it was there, then it meant she was still missing him. It meant she was still his, even if he wasn't allowed to have her.

* * *

In the beginning of this, he'd almost missed it even happening.

He had no idea when Usagi had first met the guy, or how. All he knew was suddenly the girls were all aflutter about some idol pop band joining their class (even _Ami_!) and Usagi for once the only person among them who just stemmed her chin into her fist and shrugged because she'd never even heard about them.

Except apparently, she did know one of them. And apparently he'd sought her out to show her around at school. And still, hearing the girls chat about this didn't really faze him at first when he walked into Hikawa shrine for a Senshi meeting on these new mysterious evil Sailor Senshi and these _other _new Senshi in addition - all of which was terribly concerning and stomach curling and yet even _Ami _was talking about these boys instead.

No, he hadn't noticed. He hadn't been alarmed apart from that very normal, very familiar, kind of sharp, ugly and guilty pang he _always _felt when he heard Usagi had spent some time with any sort of boy, because he was an asshole apparently who wanted it both ways, and this was nothing out of the ordinary whatsoever.

Tsukino Usagi, his kind and loud and cheerful and heart-stabbingly, preciously ridiculous Usako, was the most lovable and endearing person in the universe and lots of people noticed that fact, because how could they not? It wasn't anything out of the ordinary.

He'd brushed it off and hadn't worried because Usagi had just rolled her eyes and dismissed the boy and Mamoru had forgotten for a moment that this was exactly how they'd started too — even when it felt like two lifetimes ago.

He hadn't worried because so far, even when lots of people glanced her way in adoration, she's never looked the same way back at them. Somehow he'd forgotten that was a possibility, even when he lied to himself so often to insist that this was exactly what he wanted for her.

(_Should_ want for her.)

No, in the beginning of his obliviousness, it was all business as usual. He would try to breathe deeply and not look at her too long or directly in the eye, and when he did after all and those precious, beautiful eyes were too red-rimmed and pained when they returned his gaze, he'd unearth some co-ed he would take out for a study session or coffee somewhere that Usagi might see.

Because he did still think the best way to make her stop hurting was to hurt her more until she hated him. He was doing a good job of that, he thought.

And so really, it all came as a shock that threw him so badly he hadn't been _prepared_.

Running into her was, of course, not out of the ordinary at all, either. He did it like clockwork. Something in his bones that would always pull him toward her.

But this time she wasn't alone when he turned the corner and his eyes flew to her because they couldn't ever not.

"I don't like the way she treats you," Usagi was saying, and stopping in front of one of the long row of red vending machines and dug around in the pocket of her school skirt.

It was getting dark, the illuminated display of the vending machine cast its light on her in a way that made her shine in bright color from the waist up, and that guy, navy school uniform of Juuban High and hideous ponytail, wriggled his eyebrows and stopped next to her, looked down at her, watching.

Mamoru froze, immobile. And for once, Usagi didn't notice him.

"Aww. Are you worried about me, Odango?"

It would be the first time of many that Mamoru would hear him call her that, and yet this first time was by far the worst. As if something precious had been taken from him. A privilege he hadn't even known existed, and everything in him constricted painfully. It was an ugly, sudden feeling, this want to scrub the word off this boy's tongue so hard his lips could never form the word again.

She scowled and it was exactly the same scowl she always used to give Mamoru when he called her Odango Atama, and dug a few coins from her pocket and they clinked together in that high, sharp noise that coins tended to make.

He knew he was eavesdropping. Knew he should either turn around or say hi. Knew he was horribly overstepping her boundaries, and yet, he slanted against the wall and the shadows with a choking heart he couldn't quite control. Begged himself to believe it was only because his body and his heartbeat were currently betraying him and he would not be able to mask his face right now if she were to detect him that he decided to hide.

"Don't call me that." Her tone was sad, and Mamoru knew it was his fault. Suddenly, he had more reason to hide, to flee, to go.

But he didn't. He leaned against the vending machine behind her. She would only have needed to turn and she would see him. But she didn't turn.

The douche picked up on her soft sigh, though, threw her a concerned look.

"She's working you too hard," she added, rolling her shoulders back in stubborn defiance, bringing their conversation back on track. And then, "Hold this," and thrust out her slender leather book bag to him without waiting for an answer while she bent down to slip a few 100 Yen coins into the machine.

He did, blindly, kept on talking, stood too close while she pressed buttons and waited for the machine to loudly drop her purchase, and kept the conversation going with a glint in his eye and it all felt like a stab to the heart. It felt too familiar.

She knew him for barely three weeks or so!

"Oh, you can absolutely take her place if you're offering," he blatantly flirted.

Mamoru bristled. It ran down his spine, and caused his legs to twitch, caused everything in him to want to move between them, even when Usagi didn't get it.

"Huh?" she was bent down to reach into the metal flap now and looked back up at Seiya and Mamoru couldn't see her face, but she sounded bewildered.

At least the asshole had the decency to flush bright red as he looked down at her, and pressed a hand to his neck.

"You know… working me too hard…?" he mumbled, blushing. "Nevermind. That wasn't my best joke."

Mamoru clenched his fist.

But Usagi laughed and it _hurt_. He didn't remember the last time he made Usagi laugh. Mamoru only made Usagi cry.

"You're such a friggin playboy," she said and got up, bright yellow bottle with sparkling lemon tea in her hand, and she untwisted the bottle.

She didn't ask for her bag back. He carried it with his over one shoulder as he set off with her.

"I am absolutely not," Seiya Kou grinned, and Usagi tipped her head back, golden streamers of hair shifting against the dramatic backdrop of a red-and-orange-and-pink-and-purple sunset sky as she drank in big gulps.

Mamoru wasn't following them. He wasn't. This was just… this was where he was headed. It really, really was. His bike stood just two streets away parked at the crossing. It _was_.

But he could imagine Usagi's roll of her eyes only too well, even when he didn't see it from where he walked.

"But I'd better save the inappropriate jokes for one of our next dates, I get it," Seiya said and Mamoru stumbled.

_No_.

Seiya was glinting down at her, almost bending, almost hopping, almost prancing and preening and—

"We're not dating!" Usagi hissed, dancing on her tiptoes, doing that thing she used to do with _him—_

Except it was nothing like it had been between them, even when it was _completely _like that. Because Seiya flirted with more fight in it than Mamoru ever had. He flirted and he meant it and he did it openly and earnestly and with his heart playful and unbroken and unguarded.

"Yet!" Seiya winked. "I might not yet have convinced you of my dashing personality and stunning looks, but I am getting there."

Mamoru had to stop. He couldn't take this. It shot through him, and yet he kept walking, kept listening like an asshole and a stalker when it wasn't his place but—

"Sure, keep telling yourself that," Usagi said in that voice he knew too well, that dripping acid that was laced with utter sweetness.

"Or, you know, you could just give in and save me all the trouble. I'll also help you with math," Seiya purred down at her with that obnoxious grin.

What an arrogant asshole. What a smooth fucking bastard.

"And where would be the fun in that?" she said, not missing a beat, and goddamn did he miss this Usagi. This playful, confident girl that didn't take any shit and gave back as good as she got.

And then her hand bridged the space between the two of them, and she held out her fucking bottle. She was sharing her drink. She didn't even voice it.

Mamoru pushed two hands into his hair and grabbed on tight when Seiya wordlessly took it, tipped his head back, and drank from where Usagi's lips had just been as if it was no fucking big deal, as if they did this every day. And maybe they _did_.

"Plus," Usagi said, absolutely unfazed. "Your grade was worse than mine, get off your horse."

Seiya handed back the bottle, swung it in her face. "You can help _me _with math, then."

Usagi snorted, pulled the bottle from Seiya's grip, "Yeah, right."

And then she leaned over and nudged her _elbow into his side_. "I know a number of girls very willing to help you out who actually know math."

Seiya's shoulder lifted and dropped. "Yeah, but not the girl I'm into."

Mamoru choked. Oh god, no. He could not listen to this. He could not—

And Usagi was being _Usagi, _and she didn't even _get _it and—

"Oh?" She perked up. "There's a girl you're into?"

Oh god.

"Mhmm." Seiya threw her an amused look.

She was too precious, she was too—

"What's she like?"

Seiya shook his head at her, eyebrows lifted, grinning. He wasn't even blushing. This wasn't even painful for him or embarrassing or any sort of problem to put into words or—

"Oh, you know, calls me names, long-ass, funny hair, talks to her cat when she strolls across town like a crazy person—"

Usagi stopped, turned to face him, rolled her eyes dramatically. "I meant for real. Besides, I prefer the term 'lunatic'."

He threw her a grin, all the 'do you now?' in his eyes, but went right on "—absolutely delightful to talk to, not a shy bone in her body, thinks I'm kind of atrocious—"

"Doesn't sound like it's working out with her, I take it," Usagi deadpanned.

He nodded cheerfully. "Not yet, but I'm working on it."

"Ah."

"Yup, our next date will be so spectacular, I only need to get her to agree to it."

"We're _not dating, Seiya_!"

"Yet!"

"UGH!" She stomped her _foot_. She looked like she was ready to throw her shoe, and Mamoru felt like, felt like—

Loss. He felt like losing. He felt like falling to his knees and begging for forgiveness.

He stood rooted to the spot. In front of him, Seiya and Usagi stood facing each other. They stood in front of Mamoru's fucking motorcycle. And apparently, it was the crossing where they parted. Small murmured words and smiles he couldn't hear this time, and then, when Seiya was already walking away and into the dramatic reds of the sky, Usagi called him _back_.

"Hey Seiya?" she yelled, loud and booming and making a poor older man and his dog walking near her jump.

Seiya turned back. "Hm?"

"Do you really wanna study together?" she asked, loud and clear.

Bastard.

Bastard's lip slipped into a face-splitting grin.

"I'd love to," he crooned.

And then she _giggled_. She giggled and she waved him goodbye and he made an obnoxious, over-the-top 'at-your-service-my-lady' bow before he turned and left and waved back over his shoulders.

"See ya, Odango!"

And she _stood _there and _watched _him and still _giggled _and—

And yet Mamoru had his special power ready. He stood where she had to walk back to get to her street, and he didn't think and so he stood there rooted to the spot. And the very second her eyes found him, all traces of that smile fled her face and was replaced with sadness.

"Mamoru," she breathed, startled.

He swallowed.

"Usa."

Her brow furrowed in confusion and he could see the change in her more dramatically than he'd ever had before. How suddenly, she was tense. How her voice shook more, was higher and quieter. How she clutched her newly returned book bag with white knuckles.

And then her eyes found his bike, and she made a little 'ah'-sound.

"It's late," he croaked. He was so stupid. "Why are you still out?"

As if he hadn't just followed her and eavesdropped on her.

"Uh, I was watching a few friends train for a performance."

_Friends_.

His throat was too dry.

"A performance?"

"A musical," she corrected.

"Ah."

She nodded, turned to go. Because why wouldn't she—

Even when everything in him screamed at him to run to her and tell her his biggest, darkest secret and make her understand why he was doing this and—

And to beg her to _please _not to fall for that guy. _Please_.

"Do you need a ride home?" his traitorous mouth begged breathlessly.

Her eyes flashed wide and he wanted to hit himself in the head. This was the kind of behavior he wasn't allowed.

"O-ok," she stammered, wide eyed, confused.

And god, he shouldn't have done that. It was awkward. It was too much. It was the first time she'd ever ridden on his bike with him, and when he kicked the engine into life and her hands slipped around his middle, her hands were shaking.

His were, too.

It was too loud, it was too much, and his skin was much too aware of the fact Usagi was lost to him and yet pressed against his back, and he drove a bit too fast.

It took only a few minutes. Not a single red light. They lived close to each other after all.

He slowed down when he took the corner into the street he usually never allowed himself to drive through, usually always made a detour around, and stopped in front of her house, kicking his leg out.

His hands were still shaking when she climbed off from behind him, and handed him the spare helmet.

He was an asshole. And he made sure to take it from her in a way their hands brushed.

She visibly jumped. High and sudden. Then she swallowed, and looked at her shoes.

"How's Kasumi-san?" she mumbled towards the cobbled street.

He blinked, fingers twitching at the handles of his bike. "...who?"

Her eyes shot up at him with a frown. "…the girl you've had hanging from your arm the past couple weeks?"

Oh.

He swallowed, didn't answer, then shrugged and looked away.

"You have terrible taste in women," she said with a sigh.

He shrugged again. Bit the inside of his cheek, because that really, really, really wasn't true.

When he left, she looked after him, too. But there was no giggling, only that haunted look in her eyes, and suddenly he regretted nothing more than that she'd had to see him today.

If she hadn't, would she still be smiling now?

* * *

He'd gone home and spent the rest of the night online, then repeated that for the foreseeable future.

Every last colorful fansite he found, Mamoru clicked through it. Seiya Kou. Everything he could find on him. Every last scan of every article, and it pricked on his skin and his conscience because what the fuck was he doing.

But he kept going. The next morning, he bought the first tabloid in ages, skipped right past the infuriating images of the Senshi battles and the article on Tuxedo Mask and to the exclusive interview with Seiya Kou instead.

But his mental folder was filling up, and he knew the suspicion was misplaced, he knew it, he knew where it came from and why it was there, but also… They'd come out of _nowhere_, the Three Lights. He was all open, off-handed jokes and playful personality and answers-every-question and did even the stupidest things on any stupid game show and yet - yet it was all superficial. No info on where they grew up, on where they went to school before they joined Juuban High, not a single photo of parents or loved ones or anyone. In fact, the people who did appear in the sidelines of some photos? Minako. Ami. Makoto. _Usagi_.

Usagi appeared on friggin _television _with Taiki.

And besides, what kind of stupid name play was this? What were the odds? All three of them with the first name Kou? Meaning 'light'? The three fucking lights? Oh come fucking on.

The next time at Hikawa, when they were actually supposed to have a meeting and Rei's small TV was on in the background to catch the news, when a segment popped up about the Three Lights, and the girls all stopped what they were doing and began to chatter...

It was Usagi's eyes - popping up, bright and joyful and like he barely remembered them because she never looked at him that way anymore - when the camera panned to one of Seiya's cheeky winks…

Mamoru pulled the plug of the TV and pretended he'd fallen over the chord when the girls protested loudly.

* * *

_Search for your love_

Why did it have to be _his_ fucking voice of all things? Why did it have to be _this_ fucking song that spoke to him like so?

_You have always been shining so brightly  
_ _Your smiling face is just like a tiny star  
_ _I have been treasuring it (Eternal starlight)  
_ _On that day I could not come and protect you  
_ _I just held my tears of regret inside  
_ _I am still feeling the pain (I won't forget you, sweetheart)_

He glared at the shadows that played across his ceiling, fingers twitching as they lay on the mattress next to his cheek in the dark, ready to reach out and finally put a stop to this.

_Your strong scent, I'm always (searching for it)  
_ _Can you hear my voice calling out (I love you so)  
_ _Where are you now? (Moonlight Princess)  
_ _My lovely princess_

Who was it his princess was thinking about now?

It all felt suffocating, and he kicked at the cotton sheets he was so hopelessly tangled in because his chest was too tight and he couldn't not move.

This should be what he'd want.

But his eyes burned and his lungs ached and he reached and blindly pushed the back-button once more.

_Search for your love…_

He hated that song. He hated it.

* * *

At some point, Usagi had stopped cringing when Seiya called her Odango, and it really hurt in a way that he had no right to feel hurt about.

He had no right to feel like he was being replaced. No right at all. Two years ago he'd broken her heart to keep her safe, vowed to make her hate him. He had no right to feel that pit in his chest that was supposed to be a heart and yet felt like bleeding stone at the thought that she might actually stop loving him and love someone else instead. He had no fucking right.

But there was this angry, petulant, accusative voice in the back of his head that was toxic and broken and whispered that it really wasn't fair; he had no say in the matter either; he would love her until he finally keeled over and died, and why should she get to move on?

He had no fucking right. None.

And so, he contended himself with the burning feeling that at least, if Usagi chose to fall for someone else, at _least_, let it be something decent, and not an arrogant flirt of a fucking pop idol.

The first time he was near when Seiya Kou asked Usagi if she had a boyfriend, she sighed in a way that indicated it had been far from the first time the boy had asked her that same question.

"I told you I'm not a good choice for a date," she'd said with a heavy sign, and the boy had frowned, then poked her side with a little, concerned, 'hey'.

It was a look that was very apparently to be followed up to be an offer of comfort. A shoulder to cry on. That if she wanted to talk, he was there for her.

All reasonable things he wished for her. He did.

And yet he quickened his steps. It was the day he was introduced to Seiya Kou.

Seiya had directed the very same smile at Mamoru that he'd witnessed the guy direct into any camera ever. A little winning, a little boyish, terribly sure of himself, and he stuck out his hand, while Mamoru once again fantasized about cutting off that stupid ponytail.

Maybe he could break into their flat with a pair of scissors in the middle of the night. Tuxedo Mask was a sneaky bastard after all.

"Seiya," he'd said.

Mamoru had stuffed his hands in his pockets and tried to keep his voice neutral when he mumbled, "I know who you are." And only very belatedly, "Chiba Mamoru."

But the damage had been done and Seiya threw Usagi a look, eyebrows raised, in silent, infuriating, communication.

"I thought you didn't have a boyfriend, Odango," he said with what was only half a grin.

Usagi shrunk in front of his eyes. "And I don't," she said, and her tone was the one she always had in his proximity, not Seiya's.

Seiya blinked, looked at Mamoru and then back at her.

"Oh!" he said, as if something suddenly made sense. An 'oh' that would later haunt Mamoru for years.

Immediately, Seiya's eyes grew full of concern, and he stepped a little closer to her, and made polite small talk with Mamoru.

Like Mamoru was the outsider. Like Mamoru was the intruder.

Ami finally arrived about 5 minutes later with the books he'd borrowed, and he ran with barely any goodbyes.

* * *

The day Sailor Iron Mouse had targeted Seiya Kou for his star seed, Tuxedo Mask was first on the scene.

Though that strictly wasn't true. Because Usagi was, just not as Sailor Moon. Usagi was there as Usagi. Tucked under Seiya's arm. Because they were on a date. On a sunday. In an amusement park.

(And a zoo. And a dance club. And rollercoasters and haunted houses and three consecutive rides on a ferris wheel after four servings of takoyaki and yakisoba. But he only found that out way later and only secondhand and obsessed over it forever.)

He'd stood there and stared and felt like Seiya had stolen his fucking soul.

The few precious weeks Mamoru had had with her, Usagi had wanted to go to an amusement park, too. He'd suggested boat rides and cafés and botanical gardens and park benches instead, and she'd pouted but then shrugged and went with him with a smile, grabbing on to his arm.

But she wanted amusement parks. Usagi had always wanted amusement parks. She wanted cheerful and lively amusement parks.

Usagi was clutching at Seiya in panic, Sailor Moon through her eyes frantically looking around for an out but never letting go of the boy, when Tuxedo Mask dropped from a beam up ahead and simply reacted.

He didn't know what he was thinking, although of course he knew exactly what he was thinking.

You don't leave a victim behind, you save them. And yet, instead, he grabbed Usagi and wrenched her from Seiya's arms under Usagi's immediate protest and flew off with her, leaving Seiya absolutely defenseless under attack.

In all these years, through all this pain and heartbreak, Usagi had never looked at him like she did that day. A deep, betrayed glare.

"What the hell," she yelled right against his arms where she tried to kick herself free. "Mamoru, what the _hell_?!"

He froze, dropped to the ground as if waking from a stupor, and she wrenched herself free and was running _back—_

"We have to save him!" she screeched, and he could barely catch her to grab around her arm.

And she didn't react _again_.

He'd just carried her in his arms and now touched her again, and usually when he did that, Usagi's eyes would grow glassy and wide and her breath would come short and her eyes would scream at him. They'd scream 'I miss you' and 'I hate you' and 'I love you' and they would haunt him and ground him and torture him and he would crave it like the fucking air.

But now? Now, she was just panicked. For _him. _For _Seiya—_

Now, he didn't even have _that_ anymore.

"Sailor Moon can help him better than Usagi can, don't you think?" Tuxedo Mask pressed out behind clenched teeth and pretended that this was why he'd reacted the way he had from the start.

Usagi's eyes widened in understanding, and she'd transformed while she ran.

Yet, when they were back inside, Seiya wasn't there.

They'd watched the death of Sailor Iron Mouse in front of their eyes, had seen Sailor Galaxia for the first time and learned the Starlights weren't here to aid Earth and fight on their side after all. And yet, all Usagi had worried about when they were gone was not Galaxia or even the simple, easy way that Sailor Iron Mouse - who'd given them such a hard time for months now - had simply perished at Galaxia's hands. No - she'd freaked out. About a little crane game Teddy bear and Seiya and whether or not they had gotten his star seed.

Mamoru hadn't been able to calm her down. She'd clutched at him and he'd hated how he suddenly breathed deeper because she was in his arms and not in Seiya's, even when she started crying hot into the hollow of his neck and babbling how it was all her fault. She never calmed down.

Because when Usagi was in Mamoru's arms, Usagi cried.

She did calm down eventually. When they found a stricken Seiya outside, Usagi had calmed down.

* * *

Suddenly, Seiya was everywhere.

Seiya went out of his way to bring Usagi home even from his own fucking joint concert with Michiru of all people. Seiya showed up in the fucking woods when the girls went on a camping trip in the mountains where Rei's uncle the potter had a hut. It wasn't enough Seiya got to sit behind her in class every fucking day, no. He just _had _to hang around her at a lake. In bathing wear. That he modeled.

Minako had not been subtle when she tacked a photo to her pinwall right in front of Mamoru when he just happened to be there for a brief update. A photo taken in front of that very hut. Of Seiya on fucking top of Usagi in the most compromising position he'd ever seen her in and Usagi's hands around his collar as she threw him off of her with a roll of her eyes and a small, huffy smile.

Minako's eyes had burned into him when she saw it. All he could do was lock his jaw shut and leave.

Mamoru couldn't take it. This was the worst he had ever felt.

And he'd felt so utterly _alone_.

(Because at least before, even when he didn't want her to —and he really, really, honestly didn't— At least before, he knew she was hurting too. It was awful and terrible and made him hate himself, because he was despicable. But before, he'd known he wasn't the only person feeling this.)

Seiya flirted and he joked around with bright grins, and every so often Usagi reacted _exactly_ like she had to Mamoru-baka back in the day. (Back before Mamoru-fucking-baka knew what the fuck he was doing to the most precious person in the world, and didn't yet know to mourn all this time he could have spent with his lips on hers instead, had he just not been such a blind stubborn dense dolt.)

She was almost back to being herself. She was exactly the person Mamoru loved. And he didn't bring her out, he couldn't.

Yet Seiya could. Seiya very, very obviously could, because there she was whenever she was around the guy.

And apparently, the girls supported it. Minako and Rei especially.

Every time this boy and his puffed up chest and his silly grin and his stupid jokes to rile her up wanted so clearly to impress her these days, the girls basically pushed Usagi in his path.

"He's good for her," Rei had said tersely one day, when he'd had the guts to ask, and then she threw him a pointed look.

He'd nodded and swallowed and hated it all.

* * *

Okay, so Seiya might make her laugh. He might cheer her up. He might be her age and share her academic woes and do things with her she actually enjoyed.

But he couldn't protect her. She was the heiress of the Silver Millennium and Seiya was only a boy.

The day that kid had materialised seemingly out of nowhere and telepathically made the whole Tsukino household believe she was Usagi's sister, he'd pretty much gone berserk. Demanded Ami run more tests, made a fucking scene about it.

Because it all hit too close to home. The last time a mysterious child had appeared (and then disappeared, never to return again), he had lost everything. His dreams had started. These two years had started. His torture had started. Excuse him for flying off the handle.

Yet, Usagi insisted that Chibi Chibi was just a kid and probably in need of protection, because of _course _she would, this was _Usagi_, and why did no one else listen to him?! They were supposed to _protect _her, goddammit.

Yet the second he'd brought out the Princess&Protection hammer, Usagi had pressed her lips together and carried the child home.

And when he'd later stomped into Setsuna's lab to have _words _with her, because Usagi had said she'd talked to her and gotten her blessing that the kid was probably not too much of a danger, and how could Setsuna of all people be so _reckless, _so _stupid—_

He'd withered under Pluto's judgemental glare.

"I think you should reconsider who it is that is making stupid decisions," she'd darkly hissed - in that way she often talked to him, yet never seemed to elaborate even when she clearly wanted nothing more than to hand him his ass on a platter whenever she did.

She'd closed the door right in his face.

(He'd never found out what exactly he had done in any past or future that the Senshi of time would address him so often with such resentment, but - even if he knew Setsuna was not capable of saying anything that might change the flow of time - he was too terrified to ask.

After all, he knew he was forever destined to be her Princess's demise.)

And yet, the kid seemed to like him. Inexplicably, Chibi Chibi seemed to like Mamoru more than she liked anybody else. Fell asleep the fastest in his arms and crawled into his lap and snuggled into him and grabbed onto his arm. Over, and over, and over, she would grab onto his arm.

Next to her own nickname, she could say no one else's name but his.

But he had a track record of being singled out by the enemy, so this didn't exactly soothe his nerves.

She was cute and all, the little one. But if she was an enemy in disguise, she was in Usagi's home. In her fucking bed most of the fucking time, and it was driving him slowly insane.

He's been torturing himself to protect this woman for years now, so she goddamn better be protected.

And so, when he received Minako's text one night that he better swing his ass over to Usagi's because they had somewhat of a situation and he better do it now?

Mamoru had been convinced he'd been right all along immediately, fell off a building because he misjudged a jump in his haste and broke Usagi's bedroom window.

Tuxedo Mask arrived at her place utterly terrified, tunnel vision driving him straight to Usagi through their connection, faint and brittle under misuse but still there when he concentrated on it hard enough. But an attack on Usagi's home could only mean an attack on Usagi personally, and so the terror spiked through his veins and made him faster and sloppier and stupid.

He was sweating and hyperventilating and his heart was hammering painfully in his throat and choking him when he followed the broken bond and ripped open the wardrobe he _knew _she was hiding in to shocked eyes and brightly flushed cheeks.

She wasn't hiding in there alone.

"Chibiii!" the child squealed with outstretched arms towards him from Seiya's lap.

The stab to his chest was so egregious it physically doubled him over.

It didn't help to find out later that basically _everyone_ had been in this house tonight but him. Haruka and Michiru and the girls and the fucking Three Lights, all of them, making a mess and unable to transform because they were too busy flirting in bath tubs while Minako was shackled to Usagi's dining room wall.

They'd been playing _cards_.

They'd all been there, invited into Usagi's home while her family was gone.

Every-fucking-single-one except him, and of course that's how it was.

Because Mamoru was the outsider. Because he didn't belong there. He didn't belong with her and he never had.

When it was done, Tuxedo Mask left without a word, like most of the others.

But he sat outside in the dark for about five more minutes and watched as Seiya helped Usagi clean up inside with the girls.

He left after the third giggle.

* * *

Because he was weak, it all caused him to hover too close.

And so, he ended up carrying a very content and snuggly Chibi Chibi on his hip while walking in painfully awkward silence next to the forbidden love of his life(s) after they'd fought Sailor Antique - a creepy multimillionaire who gave a strange and barely talking child candy and expensive antique dolls, turned Phage.

It was when they stopped at a traffic light on the red-cobbled street that was lively Juuban-dori when Usagi's expression momentarily brightened and turned soft.

When he followed her eyes up, he found a banner advertisement above the entrance to Family Mart. The Three Lights were advertising some sort of canned vegetable juice with cheesy poses, and Seiya's irritatingly bright grin was winking down at them as he brought a photoshopped can to his mouth, front and center.

Mamoru pursed his lips and couldn't contain the small grunt.

"You don't like him, do you?" Usagi's timid words broke the silence, and he looked down at her over his shoulders, startled.

He had his features back under control only a second afterwards, and ripped his eyes back away from her. Yet, they strayed back to the banner and to Seiya's easy, infectious smile.

He frowned.

"I don't, no," he said after a beat.

Usagi said nothing, looked at her feet, and then the light turned green.

Chibi Chibi squealed happily in his arm, pointing to the blinking green of the traffic light, grabbing possessively onto his shoulder with her other arm as they crossed.

They'd left the crossing behind when Usagi kneaded her fingers into her skirt and spoke next.

"I think he's a bit like me..." she said towards the red cobbles beneath her slowly walking feet. Quietly.

He whipped his eyes to her and forgot to control his eyes again.

But Usagi wasn't looking up at him.

"Maybe that's why you don't like him," she added.

He froze. Stopped in the middle of the road.

Her eyes flicked to his and directly away, and then she shot forward, pried Chibi Chibi under loud protests from his hip, and walked off.

"Bye, Mamoru," she mumbled under her breath.

He kept standing there until she turned a corner and he could no longer see her.

"Bye..." he croaked when she was long gone.

* * *

The next Senshi meeting was scheduled to discuss sightings of Lead Crow and Aluminum Siren, and Iron Mouse before them, in order to perhaps pinpoint possible locations on where they might be operating from.

Mamoru took the steps to Makoto's apartment instead of the elevator, simply because this way he could at least pretend to fool himself into attributing his hammering heart to the exertion of walking up to the 8th floor instead.

But when he walked in to the smell of Makoto's cooking wafting through the open kitchenette to the rest of the flat, Usagi was nowhere to be seen.

He frowned. "Where's—"

Makoto answered before he even finished, whisking cream in an aluminum bowl wearing a rose-patterned apron. "Seiya's teaching her softball," she said.

He was way too used by now to the lump in his throat that formed whenever the name was mentioned. By now, it was just making him numb.

He opened and closed his mouth before he croaked out a retort. "... It's dark," he said with a not at all neutral frown.

"He's been doing that all day," Minako said, and he jumped. He hadn't seen her sitting behind him, and she was watching him with calculated eyes.

He swallowed, and with stilted movements, dropped his laptop bag on Makoto's enormous dining room table.

"She got roped into this stupid bet where the softball girls team captain who's also the Three Lights fan club captain gave Usagi and Seiya an ultimatum," Makoto was explaining something he hadn't wanted to know.

His bag clanked to the wood because it fell the last bit. "What?"

Makoto's tone of voice was absolutely conversational. It was Minako's that had this calculating hue to it.

"If they don't win she can't see him anymore," she said and watched him way too closely, and it meant he couldn't show what this was doing to him.

So they were, right? They were actually dating. Usagi was dating someone. Usagi was dating a silly boy who made her giggle and who wore that stupid, stupid ponytail and—

"But Usagi sucks at softball," Makoto said, oblivious, over the steam and sizzle of a big pot of food. "Ami and Rei are gonna be back any second, though."

Yet Minako wasn't done. "Seiya is reaaaaally hellbent on not losing this," she said.

His fists hurt. And he couldn't trust his mouth. Because the question was on the tip of his tongue, just waiting for confirmation and yet dreading nothing more.

Was she his now?

Did she love him?

"Oh," he croaked.

He didn't even remember what stupid excuse he made up.

But he didn't go home like he'd set out to do. Instead, because he was a creep and an asshole and apparently a stalker now, too, his legs carried him to the pit behind her school.

And there, sitting on a bench beneath a cloudless sky full of stars, and just like he did in that fucking song, Seiya was telling her in a too soft voice how everyone carried a star in them, and how some shone brighter than others and how hers must be the brightest he had ever seen. And even when she called him out on his bullshit with a laugh and a raised eyebrow or two, Seiya assured her that no, this wasn't what he told all the girls. This was just her, because he loved her shine, and would be devastated to see it dimmed, and to lose the privilege to be around it.

Mamoru felt like screaming and like punching and like crying but he sat there behind the fence and listened to this fucker smooth-talk and smooth-talk, and why the hell did this guy have to be so earnest? Why the hell did he have to cease all flirting when he told her this?

And for once Usagi seemed to start to notice the profoundness of what the boy was saying.

He sat there staring at the stars long after they were gone.

It was Minako who found him there. Sailor Venus, to be exact, hand stemmed against her hip.

"What the fuck, Mamoru," she said as she plopped down on the grass behind the fence, next to him.

He flinched. Dug his fists into the dewy turf.

(_He's not good for her._)

"He's good for her," Minako growled, all accusation, and Mamoru squeezed his eyes shut.

"He's a show off. He's arrogant and full of himself," he said.

Minako threw him a pointed look and waited, and Mamoru deflated and yanked a hand through his hair but didn't meet her accusing stare.

"He loves her," Minako said eventually, and it killed all of Mamoru's anger.

"I know," he whispered at the starry sky.

Sailor Venus just observed him with those uncomfortably knowing, calculating eyes.

He dug out some of the grass. Buried his fingers in the soil.

"Why do you hate him like this, Mamoru?" For once her voice was soft.

Mamoru frowned. Stammered. Because of course he knew these were all flimsy excuses, they were all wrong.

He hated this guy only because it looked like Usagi might love him. He hated him because he wanted to be him. He hated him because he wanted to be allowed to love her, too.

"He…" Mamoru started, agitated. "He wouldn't know how to handle… He's a civilian. He might get into danger."

Minako's voice turned scathing once more. "Right," Sailor Venus hissed at him, all the sarcasm dripping from her voice. "You're so angry because _he's _in danger…"

He glared at the sky. "He can't protect her."

Venus huffed, brows furrowed in frustration. "She's already got fucking protection." She pointed a stabbing finger at her own chest. "Besides, we're talking about USAGI, you sexist douche."

He exhaled harshly, dug his fingers in a little further.

"What are you playing at, Mamoru?"

He studiously scowled at the sky.

"Why is this bothering you so much to see?" she pressed.

_Because I want it. Because I want nothing _more_._

"You don't want her, but you want no one else to have her either?"

He couldn't cry. He could _not _cry.

"This isn't exactly fair on her," she hissed.

His throat was tight. His voice was tighter.

"I know," he pressed out.

She raised her eyebrows at the side of his face, because he wouldn't look her in the eye.

"Do you?" she asked.

He was about to yell out an 'of course'. Because of course he knew. Of course, he knew he was unquestionably cruel. She was hurting, still, even if has was so horridly terrified her hurt was currently lessening, even if he _hated_ that she was hurting, and yet here he was praying to every single stupid soul in the galaxy that she _please _would not stop hurting over him - that she would not stop loving him back even when they couldn't be.

But Minako apparently meant something different, something more dangerous.

"Not want her? Do you? Do you really?"

He growled and yanked his fingers from the soil and jumped to his feet.

"Hey, I'm talking to you!" Venus shouted, but Mamoru was simply walking off.

"And I'm going home!" he hissed back without turning.

Minako texted him the next day that Seiya and Usagi's team had won the game, and Mamoru hurled his phone across his bed and hit the back-button on his stereo.

* * *

And then it got so much worse. How could it get even _worse_?!

Because then Seiya was a SENSHI. Someone with actual power. Someone who could actually protect her. And suddenly Usagi and he were meeting in secret and communicating across fucking ferris wheels and he was taking _hits_ for her and suddenly they were forbidden.

Mamoru knew forbidden fruit was the sweetest. He knew that very well.

* * *

Following that disastrously torturing EP forever stuck in his stereo, the Three Lights finally released their debut album. It was filled with other goddamn songs Mamoru couldn't bare. Songs that the public had awaited with fanfare and banners and school girls camping out in front of the Shibuya branch of Tower Records for the midnight release and the promise of an autograph, because they sat right there, right under glaring lights for the event.

He'd stood in fucking line to buy it the second it was out right along with the squealing masses, watched what he told himself was the three of them but really only _him _from the farthest corner of the store until he couldn't feel his fingers anymore because he had clenched them too hard and hated himself some more because apparently that feeling was a bottomless pit that always had some more room left for him.

He left when Seiya unerringly lifted his chin and calmly met his stare across the room.

He didn't bring this CD up, because he had a tiny bit of self-preservation left in him. This one, he left in his car, and only listened to it there.

_Why_? Why did that fucking boy have to fucking sing from Mamoru's fucking soul?

_In the brightly shining world of white  
_ _With your wings spread out wide you are there  
_ _But those wings are so black and heavy on you  
_ _That you look like you're being crushed by your destiny  
_

_I want to help you, I want to rescue you, if I can do it  
_ _I would even throw away my life, all for you…  
_ _When you're uneasy, when it's painful, I am there with you  
_ _Always keep showing to me your smiling face_

This fucking boy with those fucking guts to write a song about the woman that Mamoru loved with every fibre of his bleeding heart. This fucking boy with his mission on the tip of his tongue and crooning it smoothly into a microphone as if he could never be caught. Selling his serenade to fucking millions as if nobody would ever get it even when he was literally spelling it all out, hiding in plain fucking sight.

_I, Seiya, feel it, this wondrous feeling  
_ _I, Fighter, feel it, different from my mission_

What the fucking hell.

_My longing is for only one person, my precious princess  
_ _Even destruction must occur for peace day after day…  
_ _I came flowing here to the solar system, and you too are a princess  
_ _One day I was bewitched by your smiling face_

This fucking boy that had such an easy time conveying what he felt so infuriatingly earnestly, so maddening fearlessly.

It was all just so _unfair_.

* * *

His mouth betrayed him the night before Usagi sacrificed herself right in front of his eyes and he'd been fucking chained to a tree as his whole reason to live was taken from him even when he'd given everything to keep her safe.

Of course, that night he didn't know yet that he was about to come so close to losing her so soon.

This night he still thought he had all the time to be insensitive.

"Is… something going on between Seiya and you?" he'd asked Sailor Moon just as she'd turned to leave.

He blamed the mask for these words. He'd always felt a little braver behind the mask.

She turned her eyes back up and his chest constricted because yes, there it still was, her hurt.

Hurt and accusation and something new.

And then he realised it was regret and he didn't want to see it, because this regret was not for him.

She looked off to the distance. Off to the stars. "No," she said quietly. "No, there isn't."

He licked his lips and his voice sounded foreign to his ears when he spoke too quietly.

"...Would you like there to be?"

She sighed. Sailor Moon's shoulders so sad and dejected and resigned, and Mamoru knew, he knew it was his fault.

"He's the only person I've ever met who really seems to like me for who I am," Usagi said quietly, her golden brooch twinkling in the light of a street lamp. "He doesn't want to change a single thing about me."

Some of these days, when she spoke such blatant lies because he'd made her believe them… Sometime this ought to stop hurting, right?

And yet, the next thing was worse. Because it did hurt. And it also filled his chest up in awful, terrible relief.

He was so ashamed. So fucking ashamed.

She turned her eyes back to him, looked up at him with her eyes shining with pain exactly as intense as the day he'd put it there.

"It would be smart if I would want him too, right?" she whispered brokenly.

He exhaled slowly.

"It would, yes," he said eventually, and she squeezed her eyes shut and ran.

* * *

And then they took her star seed.

He'd lost his voice from screaming. It was so hoarse it was gone, just a croak left.

Miracle alien princesses brought her back, and yet now Tin Nyanko knew exactly where to look, and Mamoru no longer slept.

Michiru scared him when she appeared next to his car window out of nowhere, and he jumped clutching his chest because he was shaken and terrified and exhausted and not supposed to be here, and his pulse was running away from him.

He rolled his window down.

Her smile was sympathetic as she stood there with her thermos and a steaming cup, offering.

"Here," she said.

He took it with a broken voice. "Thank you," he croaked. It sounded awful.

"It's not your turn. You know that, right?" she said with a tilt of her head.

He nodded. "I'm aware."

A sigh. She nodded her head back to the yellow convertible parked directly in front of Usagi's house in the pitch dark. "Haruka and I are here, you can go home."

"I know."

"Are you?"

"No."

She frowned that soft smile of hers that she regarded him with way too often. But then she walked back to the yellow convertible, and shrugged her arms at Haruka in defeat.

When they'd left in the morning, Mamoru was still there, his eyes burning in that way they did when pulling all-nighters.

But they'd left about 10 minutes before Minako and Rei had arrived to pick Usagi up for school, and what if Tin Nyanko had attacked _then_?

He had to sit on his hands to keep them away from his horn when she walked out with a piece of jam toast in her mouth. He could drive her. That would be safer, wouldn't it?

But who was he even kidding? She was safer with her Senshi than with him, and so he just drove a safe distance behind and parked in front of her school and tried to still his rattled heart but it was no use.

He sat there for hours and they ticked by like years. Every minute he fought himself from slamming open his car door and running into this school and get her out of there, his mind's eye replaying and replaying the way she'd just opened up her arms and accepted her fate last night, her scream when the shots hit her, the way the black hole had encased her anyway, the way she lay unconscious in foreign arms when someone had saved her that wasn't him.

And so he watched the sun travel above her school grounds and eventually be captured by thick, grey clouds as he tried to keep his eyes open and his heart some absurd version of calm.

Somehow - he really didn't know how - he managed to remain in his car. It would be his turn to drive her back home from school in the late afternoon and he was determined to do that. Until then, he would be here. Just in case. She didn't have to know.

He hadn't even noticed when he fell asleep, exhausted beyond reason, and so the terror in his chest that woke him felt like cardiac arrest.

But it wasn't _his _terror.

Tuxedo Mask flew from Mamoru's car without a single thought spared that someone might have seen him.

And yet, the rose that hit the ground first wasn't his.

Seiya threw what he just happened to have at hand, that silly rose stuck to the lapel of his performing outfit, and Usagi stared at it and him as if he'd slapped her.

Mamoru slumped behind the fire exit, choking.

Sailor Star Fighter and Sailor Moon overpowered Tin Nyanko in less than a minute, and the sky opened and wept.

Seiya. Seiya was here. She'd want Seiya.

Not him.

Except…

He couldn't hear what she was saying at first. Something about endurance and studying and snacking and naps.

But then she screamed and Mamoru wanted to die, because Usagi was screaming for him.

"He wasn't here," Usagi's voice sobbed, sharp and loud and feral and broken because of him. "He didn't come to help me."

It stabbed his chest and he'd been wrong, he'd been so wrong. Nothing would ever hurt more than this.

"Everyday I tell myself I can deal without him. That I can do this. That I can do this without him, that I can survive that he doesn't care about me. But I can't. I _can't_."

The rain pelted down so heavy that his cape was a wet, dragging rag as he got up. He couldn't stop his feet.

"I miss him," Usagi howled as she dropped to the wet ground and Seiya stood there in the grey rain and watched her like she was breaking his heart. "I miss him so much. I die everytime I see him, and yet I can't not want to see him, even though he doesn't want me. I want to hate him so badly but every time something happens I just want _him _and no one _else _and he doesn't _care—_"

"Oh, Odango." And Seiya's voice shook in the way Mamoru's heart tore apart.

He took a step closer away from the fire exit.

"Usako," he croaked, but he had no voice left in his throat.

But he needed his voice. Because damn it all. He needed to—

He wasn't strong enough. Damn the dreams. Damn their fate. He'd fight it all.

And yet, he froze, the second he stood there and saw this and...

Because once again, Usagi cried.

Because of him. Because Mamoru only had her tears.

"Why can't I stop? Why can't I just _stop_? I'm so alone. I'm so alone without him and it hurts. It hurts so badly, and it just _never stops—_"

Seiya knelt down, reached out.

"I want him back. I want Mamo-chan back. I—"

"Can't it be me?" Seiya hushed and it cut through the rain, drenched fabric and her sobs shocked away and his hands on both her shoulders.

"Am I not good enough?"

Seiya sat there, holding onto her in the rain, waiting. Promising with everything he had that he wouldn't treat her this way if only she'd let him, with just the force of his eyes on her.

And Usagi's eyes shone with broken hope as she stared right back at Seiya.

He stood right there, where neither of them could see.

Where neither of them could see him leave, either.

No. Seiya would never treat her the way Mamoru did. The way Mamoru did every fucking day because he had to.

Because it was Mamoru who wasn't good enough and never would be. Because it was Mamoru who threatened her very existence every time he lived.

Mamoru de-transformed when he dropped back to the ground. Left his car where it was and walked like a broken man through the rain without any sense of direction and yet somehow made it home.

Because Seiya was right. Because Seiya loved her and Mamoru wasn't allowed to. However much it broke him.

Mamoru wanted to hate him. He wanted to hate him so badly.

But here was someone absolutely devoted to her, absolutely besotted with her, risking his life for her and willing to jump into the line of fire for her. Someone who _actually _had the power to protect her. Someone who could relate to life as a Senshi and living life under obligations bigger than yourself. Someone who brought her to actual dates and things she enjoyed, someone who was her age and who sat behind her in class and was sometimes failing at it too. Someone who liked things she liked. Someone fun and open and playful and extrovert, someone who could openly express what he was feeling, was willing to sing it to the fucking world. Someone who looked at Usagi and found her perfect. Someone who would give everything up to be with her, including his world and his mission and his purpose.

Someone who wouldn't make her sit around his apartment while he read. Someone she would never be bored with. Someone who didn't cause her death several times over and failed her at every point. Someone who wouldn't have such an easy time making her believe he despised her.

Mamoru wanted to hate him so badly. And yet he only hated that this fucking guy was absolutely perfect for her. And how Seiya showed him so clearly that Mamoru had never been.

And so he couldn't stop the tears from collecting in the corners of his eyes and trickling slowly, one by one, down his temples to his ears as he stubbornly glared at his ceiling hours later, and let Seiya Kou sing to him from the depths of his own soul, because dammit he wanted to be with her no matter how long this torture had been going on, no matter how broken he was, and why did this pain never stop?

Because Mamoru wasn't good for her. Because Usagi deserved better, and here it was in the form of Seiya Kou.

Because apparently, his decision back then had been right.

Why did he have to be right?

_Running through the distant night sky  
_ _Now I make a wish on a shooting star  
_ _Whispering I want to be with you (Please tell this to her, starlight)  
_ _As time passes by, we become adults  
_ _I have finally realized that  
_ _The broken pieces are not enough (Please stay by my side, sweetheart)_

With a whirr, the song ended. It was only a beat of silence before it started back up again, automatically, because it was on repeat, now. Because Mamoru had surrendered.

_Search for your love, the crystals of the heavens  
_ _Search for your love, please don't start to cry  
_ _Search for your love, I really  
_ _Want to hold you close to me now_

* * *

fin

* * *

_Sooo. Just a small reminder that you can find the happy ending in La Douleur Exquise?_

_The original songs included in this fic were quite obviously Nagareboshi He (Search For Your Love) and Ginga Ichi Mibun Chigai na Kataomoi (One-Sided Love Across the Galaxy), Seiya's image song. I used the translations by Kurozuki. Because yes, I think a Mamoru in a break up arc extended universe that had to be around for Stars would listen to these songs and they would speak to him way too terrifyingly torturously. Sorry?_

_Anyway, yeah, here's how I see this playing out when Mamoru thinks he actually has everything to lose because he already lost it. (Ya know, in drastic comparison to when I think he WOULDN'T - like when he's in a securely committed and established relationship with Usagi, and not threatened by Seiya at all - like how I wrote that dynamic in Yugen.)_

_Either way, all the thanks to my friends: My beta Uglygreenjacket who sticks with me even when she's not a Seiya fan, and Antigone2 my champion Seiya fan, thank you guys for your feedback and your time and having my back when I freak out about making Mamoru freak out!_

_ANYWAY, guys, I hope you liked Mamoru's latest stay in purgatory at least a little bit, and I'd be delighted to hear about it! _

_Mwah! _


End file.
